Chase Twichell: A Problem Concerning Metaphor (January 2017)

Chase Twichell’s lecture tackles the essential conflict between metaphor—seeing one thing in terms of another—and the Zen practice of trying to perceive things exactly as they are, unobscured by human associations, predilections, and assumptions. Looking at Chinese, Japanese, and American poems, ancient to contemporary, she explores a variety of ways in which figurative language can create fissures which allow us to see meaning that resides outside the container of words.